Car wash is a profitable and high-margin business. Let's analyze the main points of drawing up a car wash business plan. How to organize work? How much money, time and effort will it take? How quickly will such a business pay off and begin to bring real profit? How to avoid common mistakes? In the article, we will consider how to open a car wash from scratch and how to draw up a business plan with calculations.

Advantages and disadvantages of opening a car wash

The popularity of car washes is due to their extreme practicality all year round. Autumn and spring bring slush and mud with them, so during this period a visit to the car wash is included in the weekly schedule of almost every driver, just like in summer, car owners try to maintain their vehicles. However, car washes do not stand idle even in winter - then reagents, salt and sand are washed off them.

Let's start with the advantages and disadvantages of this business. The main target audience of a car wash is middle- and high-income people who want to save their time and keep their car clean.

Opening a car wash from scratch: registering a business

To register in a tax car wash, an individual entrepreneur or LLC is created. The table below lists and analyzes the main benefits, as well as the required list of documents for each of the forms of business. When registering for OKVED, select the main activity: 50.20.3 "Provision of other types of services for the maintenance of motor vehicles", this group includes washing, polishing, applying protective and decorative coatings on the body, cleaning the interior, towing and other similar types. Additionally, you can register OKVED 52.1 "Retail trade in non-specialized stores."

Business Profitability

A car wash is considered a very profitable enterprise that can bring considerable income. Experts estimate its profitability at about 40-100%, but in reality this means a full payback within one year and a quarter (12-16 months), or, in the case of more expensive options, one or two years.

Answering questions about opening a car wash (Nikolai Yarkeev)

The video provides detailed answers to typical questions about opening a car wash.

How to open a car wash: a business plan

A business plan is one of the most important stages in planning the opening of an enterprise. Very often, further success depends on a well-thought-out business plan. We offer a universal version of such a strategy, which will help answer the question "how to open a car wash?" from the financial and material part.

Main points:

• business;
• business strategy;
• car wash market
• marketing features.

Actual financial costs depend on many factors, including:

• preparation of documentation;
• land costs;
• the location of the land;
• building directly;
• costs for materials, equipment;
• the cost of repairing the car wash and operating the equipment.

Paperwork

This point should be taken very seriously so as not to run into problems at the very beginning of the journey.

You can find the list of documents required for obtaining a sanitary-epidemiological conclusion in paragraph No. 19 of the order of Rospotrebnadzor No. 776 dated November 21, 2005.

You will also need the following documents:

• lease agreement for a land plot (obtained at the Moscow Land Office);
• conclusions from such city services as the Fire Service, Gossanepidnadzor, MP "Mosvodostok", Moskompriroda;
• permission from the district council where it is planned to build a car wash;
• construction plan approved by the Moscow Committee for Architecture.

In addition, during checks you may be asked to:

• land lease agreement;
• agreement on waste disposal and site cleaning;
• documentation on registration of cash registers;
• site plan with marked boundaries of the site.

In addition, before starting work, you should notify the Communications and Transport Department of the Moscow Government about your plans.

Place for car wash

In addition to the question "how to open a car wash?" no less important is the question “where to open a car wash?”. The most advantageous location of the car wash will be its proximity to gas stations, car parks, technical stations, thus allowing the driver to comprehensively resolve all issues related to his transport.

Also, such enterprises are advised to be located at suburban entrances and exits, on busy highways, however, too large a flow of cars can also have a very negative impact.

Note: it would not be superfluous to personally visit three to five car washes and evaluate the following parameters: the number of customers per day, where the car wash is located, what is the capacity of the road closest to it.

How to evaluate the client flow of competitors?

Here is one simple way to estimate customer traffic, which will allow you to calculate the possible income depending on the choice of location. In the car wash business, the key success factor is the location, and at the location, the main parameter is the throughput, how many cars pass near the car wash.

To evaluate the client flow (traffic) at competitive car washes, you should spend 1 day. Take three measurements: morning, afternoon and evening. For example, a car wash is open from 9-00 to 21-00 (12 hours). Take two measurements in the morning in the afternoon and in the evening (i.e. 6 in total). The first measurement is how many cars pass within 15 minutes from 9-00 to 9-15, from 13-00 to 13-15, 18-00 to 18-15, and also how many cars drive into the car wash. Then multiply by 4 and divide by 3 to get the average amount of traffic on the road and the average number of customers in the car wash per hour. You can calculate the average percentage of cars that stop by (for example, you get 2%, which means that 2 cars out of 100 stop by to wash).

To find the daily traffic, we multiply the average value per hour by 12 (12 hours of work). In this simple way, you can calculate traffic from competitors. This value can then be used to calculate car wash income per day. To do this, you need to multiply the number of customers per day by the average check of the institution.

For example, we have 200 cars every day. The average bill of a car wash is 500 rubles. This means that the gross income of the cafe per day will be - 100,000 rubles.

Required premises

The room should be quite spacious, however, calculate the place so that it is enough for all clients, but at the same time there are no extra jobs for which there would not be enough clients. Ideally, you can rent such a room at the ATP, which has a number of advantages. So, you will have fewer problems with documentation (you will not have to obtain a significant part of permits and other things), and this option will automatically link to your company some of the customers who have previously used the services of this ATP. Do not forget to take part of the room for storage.

Water purification system for car washes (important point)

At first glance, it may seem that this is one of the most unnecessary items that you need to follow to open a successful car wash, and that information about it can even be scrolled through. But it's not. Modern environmental standards require impeccable compliance with them.

Special filters for water purification are designed to purify water used in work from chemicals, fats, oil products and other unwanted substances from wastewater. Such systems are placed in heated rooms, where the temperature constantly exceeds +5 degrees.

The figure below shows the layout of equipment in a car wash. As can be seen from the technological process, after washing the car, sand, dirt and silt enter the drain. Oil products remain in the chambers and do not enter further into the purification system. As a result, purified water is supplied to the washing pump from the pumping station.

How to open a car wash: footage

It is important to pay as much attention to the issue of hiring employees as to issues of a material nature or documentation. Each employer has their own ideas of a good employee, but we advise you to first of all pay attention to the following two key characteristics:

• high professional level, availability of applied knowledge and skills;
• friendliness, ability to win over, responsibility (allows you to attract customers and make them permanent).

The optimal mode of operation is around the clock. The number of employees is 5 washers and 1 foreman.

For the position of a foreman, it is better to look for executive workers and those with experience in a car wash; for the position of washers, you can select low-skilled personnel.

The cost of starting a business

The funds spent on opening a car wash can be divided into two categories: space rental costs + equipment costs. Equipment includes:

• high-pressure apparatus with heated water ($1800-3000);
• a high-pressure apparatus that supplies water to 1 post ($ 500-1300);
• treatment systems ($4800-6600);
• compressor ($200-250);
• washing vacuum cleaner ($ 400-550).

The most popular types of washing equipment are devices of the German company Karcher. Equipping one place with an automatic Karcher portal car wash will cost 100 thousand dollars.

In addition to German companies, Italian and Danish companies remain popular on the market.

In addition, you will need consumables (like shampoo, polish, certain chemicals). When servicing 30-40 cars daily, about $300 per month is spent on consumables.

How much can you earn?

Your profit depends on many factors, however, in order not to get confused in abstract phrases, we will give approximate numbers that you can focus on. Calculations were made on the basis of a free-standing non-garage type sink for 4 places.

When servicing (on average) about 200 cars per day, the cost of servicing each order is within 500 rubles. In this scenario, the total monthly gross profit reaches 3 million rubles.

The main items of expenditure are taxes and salaries. In general, under this item, you will have to pay 2.2-2.5 million rubles a month in total. Net income will be about 500,000 rubles (conditional figures). Payback of business 1-2 years.

We repeat that these are only approximate figures, which in fact can depend on many factors and will change both in the direction of increasing income and in the opposite direction.

Evaluation of the attractiveness of a business by a magazine website

Business Profitability	(3.5 out of 5)	Business Attractiveness 3.3
Project payback	(3.0 out of 5)
Ease of starting a business	(3.5 out of 5)
A car wash is a highly profitable and fast payback project. There are more cars in Russia every year, and the need to save time on car washing is only growing. The payback period for initial costs is ~1.5-2 years. The business has seasonality in sales and possible recessions in the summer, which will require additional staff and financial safety margin. Key factors for business success is: location near the traffic of machines.